Chrono Compendium
Enhasa Halls - Chrono Series Analysis => Characters, Plot, and Themes => Topic started by: ThatGuy on December 06, 2017, 11:19:53 pm
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So opening and looking at this fan art piece of Zeal, I realized something!
Zeal was thouuuusands of years before Guardia and all that. And it was wiped out, almost totally. People started completely over. So the timeline isn't objectionable, in a way (unlike the 65-million year BC where humans were around), it's just that humanity had to really start all over after that.
Kind of like 2300 AD.
So, really, 2300 AD is similar to 11600BC, or so. I never thought of it this way- but Lavos caused a near extinction event more than once...
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And now, as I write this, it makes me wonder if there's another story between that 12,000+ year time period. Did Lavos fuck up the world then, too?
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Almost all the dates in this game have some connection to Lavos.
65 million bc: when Lavos landed
12000 bc: when Lavos punished Zeal's hubris and destroyed their civilization
600 ad: when Magus summoned Lavos to do battle, and was defeated (in the lavos timeline)
1000 ad: not much, but a random NPC mentions earthquakes caused by Lavos.
1999 ad: when Lavos destroyed the world, of course.
2300 ad: The end of Lavos' life-span, and the growth of his spawns.
an important consideration here is the Entity. Robo posits that the gates were created by an Entity that was reliving its memories, sharing its dream with the party, and recruiting them to stop Lavos. Based on this, I would conjecture that the Entity was dying in 2300, it was reflecting on its defeat by Lavos and its impending death, and having flashbacks to the important 'turning-points' in its vast life. I'm not sure of the significance of the present, except that its during the youth of Chrono, Marle, and Lucca, who were chosen by the entity to be its champions against Lavos.
Lavos caused no less than three extinction events. First, his fall wiped out the Reptites. Second, he destroyed Zeal for their impudent act of draining too much of his power. Finally, he destroys the world in 1999, either because civilization has become too powerful, or his biological clock tells him its time to reproduce (and nuke the surface to make it safe for his spawns), or both.
The fact that Lavos destroyed Zeal in particular, and not the Earthbound, is one of the strongest arguments for his intelligence imo. He was aware of the Mammon Machine siphoning off his power, he identified Zeal as the culprit, and destroyed the target that offended him, while allowing a non-magical civilization to develop. This to me proves that Lavos is not a mindless space tick, but an intelligence far above the human race, which he farms as livestock and guinea pigs.
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I think the 1000AD mention was of whirlpools, not earthquakes..? Which was a Heckran foreshadowing.
Hmmm... could be that the earthbound who survived did because it was a numbers thing? Because most of them were gone too. But I'd say you're right, he would want people to continue on, because he's collecting DNA and whatever, and thus would only kill the stuff that he doesn't like.
I'd still like it if they made a direct sequel and it turned out that Schala (not Kid) was the entity...
I don't know about the farming vs the collecting though. Did Lavos really influence the evolution of the planet? Or merely observe? We may never know...
Anyway, we could still theorize that he did a Noah's Ark-style restart of things a time or two more.
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There's a line about earthquakes in Truce Inn, but there's nothing connecting it to Lavos.
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What's the line..?
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It's the guy on the second floor of Truce Inn.
Remember the earthquake we just had?
>Yes.
We've been having too many.
Something's wrong…
Hope the "Big One" isn't coming!
>No.
No?
Airhead, huh?
Well, never mind.
Remember that earthquake we had the other day?
>Yes.
We've been having far too many lately.
Hope it's not a sign of something bad about to happen.
>No.
You're an oblivious one, aren't you?
Well, never mind, then.
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Oh, right...
That one I thought was a Heckran reference when I first played way back, but now I wonder...
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yes, that's the line I was thinking of. it's vague, but it's something.
the important thing about the Present is that it's 1000 years before the Day of Lavos. Chrono and his friends would not live to see the apocalypse, and neither would their great great grandchildren. yet the party decides to go on an adventure through time to save a future that is too distant to directly affect them. this underlines the selfless, altruistic nature of the quest.
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Kind of off topic, but true...
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I always took the earthquake line as a foreshadowing to Lavos, seeing that Lavos is deep under the earth and the ground shakes when it awakens (as seen in 13000BC and 1999AD).
Just my .02 cents.
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This is my take on it as well. A single millennium is nothing for a creature that lives untold millions of years. I think the earthquakes in 1000 AD are the early stirrings of Lavos beginning to awaken. Kind of like when you wake up a few minutes before your alarm clock goes off, and you know you may as well get out of bed, but instead you roll over and try to catch a few more Zs. :P
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Maybe it was a routine check. I would think Lavos would do that sort of think until it determined the time was right to decimate the planet and lay its spawn.
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So all the ice ages and other extinction level events were actually Lavos waking up so he can be like "ahhhh, yep... still got it." ?
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so can 65 million BC be considered an apocalypse? And I wonder, though Lavos shows spawn in 2300AD, what if this happened in the past? What if there were more than one Lavos (or at least spawning a new shell?) For canon's sake we estimate the timecrash was what, 2400AD in Chrono Cross? I guess that'd make the end of time sometime after that.
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Well if 65milBC was an extinction level event (apocalypse-ish thing), it wasn't in the same way. As in, he didn't wake up, rain fire down upon the earth, etc.
There's pretty good reason to think that Lavos wasn't the first of his kind, considering he made spawn, and had to come from somewhere.
I like to think that Lavos-es travel through space and time, meaning, they might have to be spawned in 2300 AD, grow up, then go to a new planet and time travel back (or forward?) a few million years to show up at a good, early stage of the planet's life development.
And if you think about it, it kiiiinda makes sense seeing as how all these time gates seem pretty linked to Lavos. In fact... I'm about to start a new thread with a new thought...
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I am really enjoying reading these contemplative threads on different takes on different aspects of the game.
I always took the earthquakes comment as a foreshadowing of Lavos. And you know that Lavos isn't the only Lavos since he has spawn and it I know there is a line in Chrono Trigger somewhere that also convinced me of that, but now I can't remember it...
One of the things I love about Chrono Trigger is how the makers of the game used actual historic theories in the game (the falling of something from space that killed the dinosaurs.) I always thought that was so awesome. I am still convinced that Lavos is real. I'm obviously not alone in this!
Anyway, just a few thoughts I had. :)
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And you know that Lavos isn't the only Lavos since he has spawn and it I know there is a line in Chrono Trigger somewhere that also convinced me of that, but now I can't remember it...
Maybe this one?
Listen well, humans.
Lavos's children will one day have to
leave to seek new planets, and prey.
That always made me think that "our" Lavos was just one out of a litter, and its siblings were off destroying other worlds. As for how many are in a litter, we know of at least four, but those are just the ones that got in your way. I think it's likely there were more.
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You know, the simple fact that Lavos had multiple spawn would imply that there are Lavos-es all over the galaxy/universe/multiverse/who knows.
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This is headcanon, but I always thought that Lavos somehow survived the constant death and rebirth of the universe. The universe is created via Big Bang, then eventually reaches a Cold Death and collapses in on itself, only to condense and recreate the Big Bang all over again. A never-end cycle of universes.
Lavos would somehow be able to survive and flow from one universe to another, each time trying to harness that universe's strongest to continue to evolve itself... and would in turn guide the new universe's evolution to try and make it stronger than the last.
One of my head canon Chrono fangame ideas (never to be realized) dealt with this. But whereas time is malleable in this Chronoverse and can easily be changed via time travel, the new universe would actually be fatalistic time travel, in that attempts to change time end up only fulfilling events that occur. The late-game quest would be to break the chains of fate that governs this version of time travel so that people aren't bound to this form of time travel. It would have also hinted at Lavos, with Lavos ending up being the big villain in a potential sequel.
Alas! Nothing worse than unrealized story ideas.
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That would probably be the one Razig!
I'm hoping my reply doesn't come off as lame. It's been a brain-numbing kind of day. LOL
I have to agree with your theory Boo. I have to admit, I'd thought of Lavoses on other planets, but other universes never even crossed my mind! But to keep surviving it would have to go to other universes, they wouldn't be able to keep reproducing just on our solar system.
I'm actually thinking about writing a fanfic and eventually some Chrono art. I've never done either even though I'm an artist and I've done some writing as well. I'd love to know what programs people use and if there is something I could use on my iPad. And yes, unrealized story ideas do suck!!
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I'm actually thinking about writing a fanfic and eventually some Chrono art. I've never done either even though I'm an artist and I've done some writing as well. I'd love to know what programs people use and if there is something I could use on my iPad. And yes, unrealized story ideas do suck!!
PLEASE GIVE THEM A CHANGE! I like read fan fictions!!
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One can never have too many fanfics or other pieces of Chrono artforms, so you have my full endorsement. :)
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Oh you guys rock!! This week we have compliance coming to work (Hoo!! Biss!) so I think either this weekend or next week I'll start writing. I'll have to write the old-fashioned way at work because I can't use my iPad while I'm working. Ha ha!
I know I have some art apps on my iPad Pro and I have an Apple pencil so I'll have to start playing with it. Or get a sketchbook and some pencils and start there. I'm really excited to get my creative juices flowing again, I haven't done anything creative in awhile. I'm just hoping I can do as well as I see it in my head. :o LOL
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Oh you guys rock!! This week we have compliance coming to work (Hoo!! Biss!) so I think either this weekend or next week I'll start writing. I'll have to write the old-fashioned way at work because I can't use my iPad while I'm working. Ha ha!
I know I have some art apps on my iPad Pro and I have an Apple pencil so I'll have to start playing with it. Or get a sketchbook and some pencils and start there. I'm really excited to get my creative juices flowing again, I haven't done anything creative in awhile. I'm just hoping I can do as well as I see it in my head. :o LOL
:wink: No hurry, just take time...
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Thanks! I love it here, you guys are awesome. I definitely feel at home here!! :D
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Lavos would somehow be able to survive and flow from one universe to another, each time trying to harness that universe's strongest to continue to evolve itself... and would in turn guide the new universe's evolution to try and make it stronger than the last.
I could see this. there's a theory that Lavos can create a 'pocket dimension', a bubble of space-time separate from the rest of the universe. this explains a number of anomalies seen in battle with him, such as the abstract background and the Time Warp... move in the final battle (which loads up a specific super-attack).
this 'pocket dimension' theory would be sufficient to explain Lavos' survival from one universe to the next.
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this 'pocket dimension' theory would be sufficient to explain Lavos' survival from one universe to the next.
THIS. Lavos really isn't a space-porcupine, he's the sinister creature lurking within the temporal whatever (and it could be argued he's really the right bit aka right pod in the DS remake). The spiky shell is really just his "vessel" and base of operations that he uses to manipulate the genetics of the planet he's hiding within.
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Not related to the topic but was touched on earlier, I started writing my first fanfic! I started this week. I'm curious how long this will be when I type it out as I've already filled 4 pages in my notebook and I feel like I'm just getting started! Ha ha! I'm also picking up a sketchpad and some pencils this weekend to start my artwork too. I'm just feeling very inspired! I can't wait to show you guys the finished products!!
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You know, everyone...
If Lavos hopped dimensions, and traveled through time (as I've argued he might), that could easily work in with the whole big-bang to big-rip thing.
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So very true, ThatGuy! Definitely something to think about!
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One of my head canon Chrono fangame ideas (never to be realized) dealt with this. But whereas time is malleable in this Chronoverse and can easily be changed via time travel, the new universe would actually be fatalistic time travel, in that attempts to change time end up only fulfilling events that occur. The late-game quest would be to break the chains of fate that governs this version of time travel so that people aren't bound to this form of time travel. It would have also hinted at Lavos, with Lavos ending up being the big villain in a potential sequel.
This is an idea I would like to see realized.
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I actually have dozens of pages on it, including a partial script. I've tried to turn it into a television pilot and removed all connections to the Chronoverse, with mixed results. I've also considering making my own game in RPGmaker or something.
Essentially it follows a new universe with parallels to Chrono Trigger (ie, Ice Age, Middle Ages, Future, etc). It begins as the infant hero and his family are passengers on a steamship in 1400AD, when it gets caught in a storm and shipwrecks on an island. They turn the island into a Swiss Family Robinson-type adventure, and our lead grows up there - he is a fourteen year old boy named Blue - and his older teenage brother Redd try to build a raft to finally leave the island and return home.
They get caught up in a similar storm, Blue wakes up in the future (3000AD) with no sign of his brother. He ends up doing timey-wimey research, initially thinking he's on another world and not in the future, and ends up teaming up with a private eye and Toma Levine (who was able to avoid the destruction of the universe by being temporally displaces - long story).
Unlike the apocalyptic future of 2300AD in Chrono Trigger, this is a proper future in which there was no Lavos and no apocalypse. Mirroring Crono's discovery of the End of Time through a time gate, Blue and his friends end of discovering the Beginning of Time, which is literally the End of Time... but since this universe exists after the first one as seen in Chrono Trigger, it now exists after the death of the first universe but before the birth of this new universe. Thus the new name. Oh, and Gaspar is there, since the End/Beginning of Time technically exists outside of space-time.
They then end up traveling to the middle ages, meet an enigmatic old wizard you helps them and seems to know more than he lets on. After events there, Blue and company travel to the Ice Age, where a tyrannical war leader is trying to unite all the primitive tribes to conquer a isolated nation that uses the remains of mysterious, high-tech ancient nation. The war leader has a grudge against Blue and is hellbent on killing him, which appears to be without reason, despite the warmonger claiming it's out of revenge. Blue has clearly never met this man and is dumbfounded.
Eventually, Blue and his friends travel through time once more and finds himself in the year 12000AD... only to find him back on the island he was originally shipwrecked on. He learns that the storm that first destroyed their steamship was actually a spatial anomaly that hurled them into the far future, a time long after humanity has abandoned the Earth and lives amongst the stars. Blue and his friends end up traveling to a huge, dyson-sphere-like construct out in space and meets the human descendants of this era, who are emotionless husks rife with genetic manipulation, and their leader, a kindly young man called the Arbiter.
Blue and the Arbiter work together to build a time machine so that Blue and his family can return to their home time of 1400AD, but Blue also wants to fix the timeline hijinks he's created in his time traveling adventures. They build the time machine, not sure where it leads, and Blue, his friends, and the Arbiter (with a contingent of scouts/soldiers) go into it...
...Which sends them back to 100000BC, a time before humans evolved. Shortly after arriving, the time machine malfunctions. Blue and the Arbiter both disappear in the time explosion, rendering the rest of party stranded in this era. They quickly meet Redd, Blue's brother (who has been stranded in this era for years and is now a young adult), who becomes the party lead. They resolve to build a new time machine and save Blue. Meanwhile, the soldiers from the future find that they like the thought of starting over, and they begin to exhibit signs of regaining their emotions, so they resolve to stay in this era... and become the first humans. Thus, the first humans on the planet are from the future... and it's a cycle.
Redd and the party eventually work to build a new time machine and return to the Beginning of Time, still resolved and save Blue. Gaspar reveals that Blue is no longer a human -- his soul/consciousness has become lost in time and now exists as a strange spatial anomaly, the same one that has been helping them time travel throughout this entire adventure.
Through their events to try and save Blue, we also learn that the Arbiter, after the time machine disaster in 100000BC, was hurled to events just before Blue's events in the Ice Age, and that he became the tyrannical leader (albeit older) warmonger with a grudge against Blue (as it was Blue that ultimately convinced him to build the flawed time machine). Just to clarift, events for the villain of the game and the events of our heroes are not in alignment.
While in the Ice Age, they witness the tyrannical leader (remember, who is actually just an older version of the Arbiter) once again time travel, this time thrown and stranded in the Middle Ages... where he ends up growing old and turns out to be the kindly wizard who helped the party (as he'd eventually lost the anger in his heart against Blue and wanted to right the wrongs of his past).
They then realize that they cannot save Blue's body, as time is a constant and cannot be changed. However, they can pull his consciousness from the anomaly at the moment the anomaly phases out of existence, in the year 3 million BC. They then journey to find three Gurus (which are the reincarnated souls of the Three Guru's from Chrono Trigger) to build a Chrono trigger / time egg, the only item that can save Blue.
They also learn that souls are recycled from universe-to-universe, which is how/why these three guru's exist in the new universe. The Melchior of this universe was a man who ironically invented weapons of mass destruction, there is no Gaspar in this universe since he exists outside of space-time and thus his soul was never recycled, and they learn that the Balthesar of this universe is actually the Arbiter...
...who is also Blue. They recruit him, and despite having been a villain in his midlife, he is now a kindly old man and joins the party. They finally travel to 3 million BC and save Blue, where we have a final major reveal. It's revealed that Blue and the Arbiter/kindly old wizard are the same person. When the time portal malfunctioned in 100000BC, Blue's soul/consciousness became the time anomaly, while his soulless body was flung into the future. Without a soul, he was an amnesiac, soulless, and comatose but eventually became the Arbiter. Thus, it's all technically the same person (but Blue has a new body identical to that when he first became a disjointed consciousness). It is also confirmed that all the time traveling in the game was the events of Blue as the timey-wimey consciousness, who has ulterior motives in putting all these events in motion...
Oh, and if you aren't clear, Blue is essentially Belthasar's soul recycled. As a kid. So your hero is kid Belthesar. Bahaha!
Realizing that all of this was ordained and their destiny, the party enters the third act in a way to break the Chains of Time and allow mankind to reclaim destiny and the right to choose their future. It gets crazy metaphysical, Spekkio makes an appearance, and the journey ends with a visit to the Crypts of Time (which is essentially the Darkness Beyond Time, except it houses the remnants of previous universes rather than the remnants of discarded timelines). They also realize that this will enable a multiverse -- instead of their only being one universe at a time, in a constant cycle of death and rebirth, the broken links of the chain can allow for an infinite number of universes... including allowing the original Chronoverse to be born back into existence.
They manage to do so and save the day. The End.
In an epilogue scene we see Blue, now quite a bit older, living peacefully aboard a space-station in 12000AD. He is studying time travel and the multiverse, when a Lavos spawn crashes into the planet below. We learn that Blue has been expecting this day, as the Arrival of Lavos was expected.
A tentative sequel would have followed Blue and new/old friends traveling through time in a new age of mankind (so mostly post 100000AD but in a new time calendar) trying to stop Lavos from destroying the planet. It would also have explored Lavos' timey-wimey pocket dimensions capabilities, making him a threat that transcends not just the planet, but in not-such-an-esoteric-way as the Time Devourer from Chrono Cross. It would also have had more of a sci-fi/fantasy feel akin to the Star Ocean series.
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That is a well thought out idea. Mine usually get a page of hand scribbled notes and forgotten about.
Blue and Redd are colorful names. :P
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And that's just the lite version, hahaha... I think it could still work as an ode to Chrono Trigger if I ever got off my ass and decided to build something like that.
But yes, there was definitely a theme there with the names. Blue has blue hair, while Redd has red hair. Go figure. I played with color themes while writing it, hahaha... Also, while Blue is the reincarnation of Balthesar, Redd is the reincarnation of Crono.
There were also a few other characters...
-Pugg, a Kilwala-esque creature that is the reincarnation of Marle;
-A Blade Runner-ish replicant bio-android called Arana that is the reincarnation of Lucca;
-A warrior monk from the Ice Ages that is the reincarnation of Ayla,
-A blacksmith-turned-soldier and widower that is the reincarnation of Slash
Plus Toma Levine joined the party, as did Magus (who has also crossed over into this universe in his pursuit of Schala). Magus would also have played an antagonistic role, seeking any means necessary to recreate the original universe and return home. But eventually he would see "the big picture" and resolve himself to helping Blue and company break the chains of fate. Like in Trigger, he'd have been the final character and a powerhouse.
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Is there a Frog reincarnation somewhere?
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I had intended to put him in and alternated Slash and Frog as one of the characters. I tried to flip some expectations and that was one of them. You expect this Frog-esque warrior to be Frog, only to be a former villain in the previous universe.
The Magus/Janus of this universe is stuck in the year 3000AD and is working as a noir-esque PI. He initially arrived in this era from the previous universe and, seeing that it's the future, found himself a fish out of water and his magical abilities stripped away (initially, but he gets them back during the story). He became a PI in order to make ends meet and try to find a way home, and his partner is actually the reincarnated soul of Frog/Glenn. Eventually, Magus/Janus turns against the characters and becomes a villain intent on doing whatever is necessary to return home, while the Frog/Glenn character is the one to bail the heroes like.
I tried to shake things up:
The Marle soul in this universe is still a princess... but she's a Kilwala-esque creature that doesn't speak in full sentences and is obsessed with makeup and glam.
The Lucca soul in this universe is a "robot" in an of itself, rather than a human sympathetic towards robots like in Chrono Trigger.
I actually just re-read my notes and I even say that I'm not sure, or finalized. I specifically have certain characters unaccounted for, haha and non-finalized.
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Sounds 8) idea just do it :wink: